Stairway to Heaven
by Peacefulsandwich
Summary: AU. Lovino Vargas and Antonio Carriedo are two dead people with the misfortune to encounter other dead people they used to know on their way to what they thought was a "heaven" (definition provided inside). Ratings may devolve to M if necessary.
1. Chapter 1

**Welcome to this story. It is mostly Spamano with some (very) background other pairings. There is no specific time where this story took place (yet) unless I write a prequel to it. Please excuse any odd grammar I may come up with, I am not a native English speaker and my life may or may not be completely different from what it is now if I were one. Please PM me about any mistakes I make and I will correct them. **

**Please enjoy the story.**

**.**

STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN

_DEFINITION: The staircase one walks up until reaching the ultimate "heaven", whatever that might be. _

Usually this definition fails to mean anything, because "heaven" was never defined.

.

After a while, "heaven" was defined. It gave the editors a relatively hard time trying to figure out something that is clear enough to look like it meant something, but vague enough to stop people from posting complaints like "I know the sky is pink in heaven, because it is, so change it".

The fact is that the sky in heaven is actually a smooth transition from white to pale blue, but the editors didn't know that.

.

HEAVEN

_DEFINITION: The one place no one ever got to, but when someone managed it (everyone will, someday) they didn't return._

Someone argued.

"You said no one got there. So how do you know nobody returned?"

To which dictionary's editors replied, "By 'no one ever got to' we mean 'no living person ever got to'. Those who actually got there don't return because they are dead, and the dead are not classified as "living people", unless they are zombies, which is rare enough to not be noted."

The one who argued argued again.

"What do you mean, rare enough to not be noted? Does it even grammarically make sense?"

The editors' response: "Is 'grammarically' even a word?"

The arguers were about to argue again when the editors had them shot.

Both Lovino Vargas and Antonio Fernandez Carriedo could care less.

They are both dead and on their way to heaven already, so the previous argument is invalid. Besides the fact that there was no previous argument, which means that it is invalid already. An invalid invalid thing is a double negative, which means that it _is_ valid.

One cannot easily think about it without getting a minor or major headache, depending on the person in question's mentality.

So what happened was that no one thought about it.

.

"Hurry the hell up!"

.

"I said, hurry the hell up or I'll leave you there!"

.

"Seriously, hurry up, you bastard or-or I'll leave!"

.

"I mean it!"

.

Antonio Fernandez Carriedo knows that Lovino didn't mean it. Lovino never mean anything he says, because he's just like that.

Antonio likes the way Lovino is.

Antonio also knows that they are both dead, which is a serious comfort because from what they have seen of death, it is far more pleasant than how life is at the moment.

"At the moment" is also lacking a definition because nowadays nobody is ever sure what the time is, or at least, none of the dead are sure what the time is, because there are no watches available and trying to tell which way is north is considerably harder in a place with no natural landmarks. There is also the time zone business in the mortal world, but nobody cares about that.

Before him is a slightly narrow spiral staircase, wide enough to let about three people walk comfortably, but narrow enough to let the unfortunate fourth person complain about falling off the side, come very close to falling off the side, and finally actually falling off the side when someone pushed him off the side, so that he will not be complaining about falling off the side any longer because he fell off the side.

The steps are made of what appeared to be glass. The one who designed them did not program them to be made of glass. He just wanted something transparent and thin, so he typed that in. The glass panels were shipped the next day, and the company he ordered from didn't do refunds. Being the designer of the Universe, he slightly modified the glass's properties so that they are rather hard to break without a hammer the approximate size and length of the Great Firewall of China. Because the Great Firewall of China does not have an approximate size and length, the glass cannot be broken, and that's that.

The designer of the Universe likes logic, but his own never seem to make sense.

Lovino Vargas stood at a spot right in the middle of the tenth step. Antonio smiled - there was his little angel. Unlike how most artists depict angels, Lovino is scowling. But to Lovino, scowling is the equivalent as smiling, as Antonio learnt when he was alive.

The background to the scene is a smooth transition from white to pale blue, and a sun. That was it.

The designer of the Universe thought heaven should be a nice place, so he designed it to be one. He also thought the stairway to heaven, despite the fact that many consider it walking up it a torture, should also be a nice place. So the sun shines just enough for it to make the glass steps dazzling, and just not enough for sunlight to burn the back of your neck. The temperature of the place is somehow always just comfortable enough to wear what the person is wearing and not sweat.

A lot of people die nowadays, so the designer of the Universe also had to work out how to solve the problem of too many people walking up the stairway simultaneously. He did it by buying more glass, building more stairways, and sending less people up each one. Currently, if one simply walks up the stairway before them they will most likely not meet anybody until they get to the top. However, if they stay still for a while they will have to meet someone else eventually, because none of the stairways are out of use.

The designer also thought about making the stairways infinitely long. That was definitely something of interest. But making it infinitely long would also mean that no one would ever reach the top, which his assistant pointed out. The designer thought about it. In the end, he abandoned the idea sadly.

"Okay, Lovi, I'm coming!" Antonio flew up the stairs and hugged Lovino so hard, they lost their balance, fell of the stairway the exact way planes shouldn't, and landed back on the bottom of the stairs, where they started.

The designer had thought of including railings to his stairways, but in the end decided that they just added to the user's desire to jump off and none of the designs he came up with were actually aesthetically pleasing.

"And look at what you've done. Back on square one," grumbled Lovino. The fall didn't hurt, not because the designer modified the area's gravity, but because neither Antonio nor Lovino were expecting it to. They were dead, and the current sort of mentality they have is similar to that of a person who would have been put in a room with soft walls if he ever spoke his mind.

Antonio laughed. Lovino complained about his laugh. Antonio laughed even more. Lovino grew more annoyed.

"So, are we even getting up or not, you bastard?"

"Oh!" Antonio almost forgot about the stairs already. Being with Lovino is enough to distract him from an alpaca version of Sherlock Holmes arresting Gilbert Beilschmidt, his ex-best friend, along with Francis Bonnefoy, another ex-best friend.

"Psh." Blowing out the air in his lungs in annoyance, Lovino scowled. "You forgot the very reason why we are here. Why am I still sticking to you?"

Like every other time Lovino spoke, Antonio laughed his highly intolerable laugh.

"Well, the boss is here and will walk up with you!" And so Antonio stood up.

Blinking in annoyed surprise, Lovino got up too. He didn't expect Antonio to get up for at least another fifteen minutes, even though the record time of Antonio sitting around not doing anything was apparently exactly 2.896 seconds when he was alive.

"So, go already!"

And so they made their way up.

.

"Aww, Lovi, why do you look angry?"

"Because you're an idiot, dammit!"

"Don't worry, Boss Antonio will cheer you up!"

"Oh, no _that_ again."

"Fusosososo! Fusosososo! Fusososososo!"

"Shut up!"

"Fusososososo!"

There was a loud "thump".

Then there was silence as the two continued their trip upwards.


	2. Chapter 2

ANNOYING

_DEFINITION: Overused._

.

LIFE

_DEFINITION: The thing you fail at._

For some reason, many considered the above definition offensive. So it was heavily edited.

LIFE

_DEFINITION (ver. 2): The thing Lovino Vargas and Antonio Fernandez Carriedo fail at._

There was less annoyance about this, because nobody knew Lovino Vargas or Antonio Fernandez Carriedo, and part of the human instinct is to disregard everything that does not concern you.

Lovino Vargas and Antonio Fernandez Carriedo knew each other, but they did not know about the definitions, so the second version of the definition stayed unedited for the rest of what one can call eternity, and neither of them are at the moment, annoyed about it.

.

"Hey, you, stop going so fast."

Antonio stopped, turned, and saw an annoyed Lovino.

Said Lovino folded his arms in sheer annoyance, and stopped too.

"Aww, Lovi, why? It's such a beautiful day! The sky is so blue, it reminds me of my best friend's-"

"_Ex_-best friend."

"Ex-best friend's eye colour!"

To Antonio's great dismay, Lovino frowned even more. He appeared to consider the sentence for a moment, and then his face expressed what one would usually call "total, absolute annoyance". This is not a rare expression for Lovino's face.

"The sky's colour is _sky_-blue. Francis Bonnefoy's eye colour is _shitty Windows 7 background_-blue."

"I like Windows 7 blue!"

"The actual colour isn't even called that, you moron."

Antonio did notice that Lovino has failed to explain the reason why he stopped walking. Being dead, things like exhaustion, weariness, being out-of-breath, and time in general does not affect them. The general concept the designer of the Universe came up with was something similar to, "you're already dead, which is totally pathetic. So I spare you the even larger amount of pathetic of being exhausted, tired and breathlessness brings. Thank me."

Those who know the designer of the Universe consider him a very nice man.

The sky above them goes through fifty shades of grey and blue every day, and fifty shades of extremely dark purple and extremely dark blue every night. Somehow, there is always enough light to see the steps and make them sparkle.

"Am I really going too fast?" Asked Antonio. He is now slightly concerned for Lovino. But then, he is always slightly, if not extremely concerned for Lovino.

"No, you bastard, of course you're not! Now shut the hell up so I can sit in peace."

Being of slow reflexes and hilarious dim-wittedness, Antonio suddenly noticed that Lovino was sitting cross-legged on the sparkly stair he was standing on previously.

"But, why would you want to-"

"Shut up!"

"Okay, okay, the boss gets the message."

"I said, _shut the hell up_!"

With his outstanding powers of observation, Antonio noticed two things: the first one is that maybe he should stop talking. The second thing is that Lovino's annoyed face is a deep scarlet. At first he was worried. Did Lovi get blood all over his face? But they are dead. Perhaps he ate too many tomatoes, but they didn't see any on their way here.

It finally occurred to him that Lovino's face was simply flushed. For what reason that is, Antonio has no chance of guessing, being the annoying dimwit he is.

Perhaps he should sit down too, not that he is expecting to get leg cramps from standing too long here, on the stairway to heaven.

So he did exactly that, and the two watched the pleasant light blue sky, pleasant few white clouds, and the somewhat pleasant sparkly stairs.

An unpleasant thing intruded upon their peace, not that the phrase "rest in peace" does not work anymore. "Rest in peace" always works. It is just extremely improbable, and the dead understands this better than most of the living.

The unpleasant thing in question was voices. Loud, obnoxious, annoying, familiar-sounding voices are flowing up the stairs. Those who own the voices are presumably, not far behind.

"Will there be pasta for dinner?"

"I repeat, there will be no such thing as pasta for supper! What an absurd thing to suggest, five times a day!"

"Shut your mouths before I shoot you both!"

"Ve!"

"Big brother, you don't have any of your firearms with you."

"Don't cry, Feli, there will be pasta!"

"Yay!"

"Vash, you made our little Italian cry. How_ could_ you?"

"Not my problem! Stop him from running across my yard first. And where's my rifle?"

"Please act civilised!"

"Vash, remember the fact that we are all, dead. You don't have a gun or a yard anymore."

"Vash?" Asked Antonio, loudly. Lovino, who was listening intently, made a growling, severely annoyed expression on his face. The effect it could have had was ruined by the blush, which for some reason, is still there.

The company beneath them stopped.

"Who the mother fuck was that?" Demanded the owner of Vash Zwingli's voice.

"It sounded like a certain Spaniard we use to know, didn't it?" Said the person who most likely is Elizabeta Héderváry.

"Ve…" Lovino wishes that his useless, annoying little brother isn't here, but he is anyway.

"Antonio Fernandez Carriedo." The German accent belonging to Roderich Edelstein stated.

"Big brother-"Lili Zwingli failed to finish her sentence.

"-Ooh, I can see them!" Cried Feliciano's voice suddenly.

Antonio and Lovino looked down. The steps were transparent, and so they could see the annoyed/slightly surprised/smiling/Italian/slightly surprised/neutral faces of Roderich, Lili, Elizabeta, Feliciano and Vash.

Antonio laughed his annoying and highly irritating laugh. Lovino flipped them the finger. He then noticed the presence of Lili and Elizabeta, and pulled his hand back immediately upon the realization.

Racing down the stairs, Antonio continued to laugh his annoying and highly irritating laugh. The surprise on the other party is wearing off rapidly, and both Roderich and Vash's expressions expressed annoyance.

"Ve! Big brother!" Feliciano raced up the stairs, and in doing so, collided with Antonio, and somehow managed to not fall off the steps together.

Lovino's face stayed annoyed.

"Go away. I thought I'd have _some_ peace here."

Unknown to Antonio, what made Lovino flush was something that would have totally thrown him out of his mind if he knew what it was.

A history of that certain thought:

Lovino have been staring at Antonio's back as they walked upwards for a while. This is when the thought appeared. Lovino attempted to suppress it, failed, attempted again, failed again, and so on, in an annoying cycle. In the end, Lovino gave in and the thought was exactly what he thought about when his annoyed face was busy turning red.

Elizabeta hugged Antonio happily, while everybody else watched. In the "everybody else" group, only Lili and Feliciano were happy, and the reason of their happiness is that they are always happy, so they don't count. Therefore, nobody else is happy at the moment.

"Ooh, I know how to make everyone happy!" Feliciano suddenly thought of something. Vash sighed in annoyance.

"What?" Asked Elizabeta.

"Everybody walk up the stairs together!"

The "everybody" in question stopped, and stared at him.

The designer of the Universe though about getting rid of the thing known as "awkwardness" in the non-mortal worlds before, but decided that he couldn't be bothered.


	3. Chapter 3

**Would just like to mention that the person I contacted about beta-reading for me is not responding, and I have problems with tenses too. Please contact me about any wrong things in other languages. **

FAIL

_DEFINITION: When something is not a "win", it is this. For more information, look up "win"._

_._

WIN

_DEFINITION: When something that is not a "fail", it is this. For more information, look up "fail"._

.

The "walking up stairs together" plan suggested by Feliciano was, and still is the first word.

The gun-type thing Vash somehow put together with stuff from his and Lili's pockets was, and still is the second word, which is a one of the major reasons why the plan became what it is now, which is the first word.

Vash walks faster than the rest of the group, and Lili could only follow him. One day, as everybody else woke up on the stairs (for whatever reason "sleep" still exists besides the fact that it is comfortable), they were gone.

"Good thing they are, too." Commented Roderich. Elizabeta added a comment about never knowing Roderich was such a "snarker".

And the days went on, with a rather dull schedule of waking up, walking, and falling asleep.

.

"You mean, we're just supposed to be doing this? _Just_ this? Walking up glass sparkly stairs?"

Lovino waved his hands in the air, to make a point.

"No, Lovino, none of us mean anything. Why were you waving your hands, by the way, besides the fact that you can't talk if you don't?" Elizabeta decided to imitate her ex-husband's "snarkiness", and added a harmless smile for effect and originality.

"Dammit, it's all that useless bastard's fault! And I wave my hands because I want to make a point!" Angry fingers pointed at Feliciano, as Lovino's rant became a shout, and everybody decided to stop and listen to it, for some reason.

"Ve?! Big brother? Did I do something?"

"And why were you waving your hands while you were explaining that you wave your hands around to make points? Were you trying to make a point about making a point? Because that seems to be quite a pointless activity to become engaged in." Roderich expertly put in. He actually enjoys watching people argue, but does not enjoy actually taking part in the argument. Just some bits of encouragement here and there, to keep the show boring enough to send a cat off a roof, but interesting enough to make its way into a soap opera somehow.

"Fuck you aristocrat, I just do it, okay? So shut the hell up, and let me continue my hand waving! Where do these "heaven" guys keep their tomatoes?!" Still engaging in the pointless activity of waving his hand while talking, Lovino demanded.

"I've actually been wondering too, Lovi. I haven't seen any tomato trees around h-"

"Tomatoes do _not_ grow on trees. They grow on _tomato plants_, you idiot Spaniard! Watch the credibility of your sentences before-"

"Ooh, Lovi, look at the unico-"

"WHAT DID I JUST SAY ABOUT CREDIBILITY?"

"What about a unicorn?"

And suddenly there were even more intruders upon the happily arguing/watching-the-argument-with-idiotic-or-sadi stic-interest group of used-to-know-each-other people.

.

"And what the fuck are you three doing here?"

"Ohonhon, what an interesting coincidence this is-"

"Okay, have you guys seen the book named 'The Situation'? 'Cause I, the HERO, was suggested by a friend to read it, and I ain't seen it anywhere!"

"'Ain't' is _not_ a word, you dimwit. And I'm, not, your friend or a-anything! I-I just thought you were too pathetic."

.

"_¡Hola_, Francis!"

"Antonio, _mon ami_! I see you are here too?"

"Yes! But as long as I am with my Lovi, I will make it through! Why are you here?"

"Same reason as you, _ami_."

.

"Ah, isn't it the deserter Briton."

"What do you mean, deserter?"

"Left me on my own with that self-proclaimed Prussian."

"What are you talking ab-"

"All alone, in a rather muddy patch of land, I might add."

"I-I-I just wanted to beat the bloody hell out of that frog over there!"

"My new suit! You still owe me!"

"Wait-"

"I needed stitches afterwards! I couldn't sit for a month!"

"Roderich, what happened? Describe it to me in detail!"

.

"Ve! I haven't found that book yet, but heaven must have a library!"

"Yeah, you're totally right! Me, the _HERO_ and you, Feliciano, will go on an adventure to find 'The Situation' and read it!"

"Yay!"

.

Occasionally Lovino Vargas couldn't help but wonder why Fate has left him alone, in a group of absolute morons. His first theory was that he offended the wrong person during his previous life. This theory was disproved by the fact that apparently the concepts of "previous life" and "afterlife" do not exist. His second theory, and his current one, is that he is just unlucky.

That is in fact, the truth.

.

"Tell me, Roderich!"

"No, I-"

"I always helped you when you were weak! And I did _so_ much cleaning for you when we were alive!"

"No, my room cleaned itself."

.

Despite showing it often, Lovino rarely gets angry.

.

ANGER

_DEFINITION:_ The thing, when appearing in fiction, is a red haze above everything. That is total bullshit, which is why most people think they rarely feel anger. Technically, any sense of injustice you experience is anger. Some people may argue that they don't experience senses of injustice. They are expressing total bullshit, and have all taken back their comments. If they haven't yet, they will.

.

Those who argued were all tortured with the concept of 'shitty edits about your face' and shot privately, their deaths covered up, and had complicated documents sent to them by insurance companies about editors threatening them with 'shitty edits about your mother' and claiming that the arguer does not exist and therefore will not receive anything, similarly to those who argued previously, and about everybody else who bought insurance in the Universe.

The designer of the Universe likes the insurance company in question's philosophy.

The only conclusion to draw out of this event, is that one should not argue with editors.

.

"This weatherman is predicting 99% of a shitstorm, and it's coming right at you motherfuckers!" Screamed Lovino.

"Calm down, Lovi, where did you get those tomatoes?"

.

MALLETSPACE

_DEFINITION_: An incredibly complex concept. Every time someone pulls something out of 'thin air', they are actually pulling it out of malletspace. The things one can pull out of malletspace is of an infinite amount, and usually those of no importance whatsoever to what is going on at the moment.

The way, to pull something out of malletspace, is that it happens at random. Your hand instinctively does a pulling motion, and you have the object.

There is no knack.

.

"SHUT UP."

"Ooh, okay, the boss will shut up. Yes he will. Yes he is doing it. Fusosososo…"

"AND STOP TALKING FROM THE THIRD PERSON POINT OF VIEW."

This is when the entire group turned.

"Oi, you git. Only _I _am allowed to correct other people's English." Being the Brit of the group, and the one Roderich was acquainted with, Arthur Kirkland naturally felt a sense of injustice at this.

"Yeah, Artie's the only one out of you peoples-"

"GRAMMAR! '_People' is a plural in itself!_"

"See? And-KYAAAAA!"

The shitstorm a certain weatherman predicted earlier has arrived.

Lovino was lucky in that the designer of the Universe was feeling nice, and sent him enough tomatoes to send everyone besides Antonio into a tomato-phobia.

No, the designer of the Universe is usually never nice.

.

Arthur, Alfred and Francis walked in a row.

Lovino wanted to get to the front of the group. So he tried to walk alongside them.

As mentioned previously, the stairs were designed for exactly three people. Unfortunately nobody in the group knew that.

Lovino complained about falling off the side. After a sharp turn he almost actually fell off the side. Then he continued to complain about falling off the side.

Alfred thought that maybe life could be easier for everyone else if Lovino just fell off the side.

So he gave him a friendly shove, and because gravity was not disabled on the Stairway to Heaven-because or else, there will be no point to have stairs, down Lovino went.

"CHIGIIIIIIIIIII!"


End file.
